Last year when I made the lil big chop, I had about an inch maybe one and half inches of hair on my head.

Today I worked up the confidence to measure my hair properly this time around.

To create a sample, I plucked two strands out.

I did the plucking by pulling on the strand from the root in order to prevent the hair breaking off prematurely along the shaft. The idea is to get a hair strand straight out of the scalp with the tag intact.

As you can see the hair really curls up in and upon itself and I can now see that Z and S pattern that everyone is talking so much about. This becomes important when you are considering hair types and textures.

{Might want to separate this, one post about my eventual length and another post about how to go about measuring}

In order to measure the hair as accurately as possible, I taped down both ends using clear tape. Clear tape is necessary so that you can measure the taped end as far as possible. Also try to tape it as straight you can. White paper is a good choice as a background for dark hair, for different hair colors try out other backgrounds so that you get the best contrast.

The next step is to use your ruler to draw line perpendicular to the ends of the hair strand.

Following this, you should now be able to make an accurate measurement of the hair sample.

Lay the ruler aligned as parallel as possible to the hair sample.

At the end of all this hard work, I’d advise you to date and number this sheet of paper hair and all and save it for a later date. This way you can figure out say in three months time how much your hair has grown. If you are going to do this it’s a good idea to try to take sample from the same general area.

You might want to try other sections of your hair just to get an overall idea of how your hair grows- how quickly, how long it is to start with as well as the curl pattern and texture. Doing this allows, I find, close inspection of the actually healthy of the hair. Check through this blog to see posts about common hair problems and what they look like visually.

Use caution when doing this, don’t take more than two samples at any one time, and don’t do this kind of measuring regularly. Personally I wouldn’t do it any sooner than a month or two because I don’t want to create a bald spot in any areas.